Samsung SDS selected by Seoul Government for Blockchain City-Wide Project

Seoul, the capital of South Korea, has chosen Samsung SDS to establish a roadmap to apply blockchain technology to the city’s entire administration to enhance citizen convenience and administrative transparency.

Samsung SDS, the IT subsidiary of Korean electronics player Samsung, stated that it has won an order from Seoul’s Metropolitan Government to establish an Information Strategy Plan (ISP) for “Innovation in Building Blockchain (Solutions) for Seoul City”.

This initiative comes in accordance with the city government’s intention to apply blockchain technology across ‘the entire municipal administration’ by 2022.

The city government has already identified multiple sectors for blockchain applications such as welfare, safety, traffic and other municipal affairs.

Initial applications would entail using blockchain’s core characteristic as a secure, immutable ledger for recording personal information of citizens, paying out unemployed youth allowances and the sale of used car deeds. The ultimate goal would be to broadly expand civic convenience and administrative transparency with blockchain technology powering the city’s entire municipal administration in four years.

The terms of the contract stipulate that Samsung SDS is now tasked to assess the environment and chart a roadmap toward both ‘introducing and spreading blockchain technology throughout the city’s municipal government’ over the next five months. Samsung’s software unit will design and propose future models alongside plans to systematically implement them across the city’s government and the public sector.

Samsung SDS chief executive Hong Won-pyo said: “Samsung SDS intends to contribute to the city becoming a world-class city by strengthening the transparency, fairness and civic convenience through its own blockchain technology and consulting capability.”

The Seoul city project marks the company’s first foray into introducing blockchain technology to the public sector, becoming the first domestic company in Korea to do so.